For a Beautiful Lady
by Drizzle117
Summary: A scene that never took place in "Eve of Destruction." Pepper saw how Madame Pom treated Sunil when she asked for his pillow, and she saw how he responded. And she isn't happy. (Peppunil; inspired by the artwork of Cartuneslover16 on DA/Cartuneslover17 here)


**For a Beautiful Lady**

_Inspired by the picture by Cartuneslover17 (on DA, Cartuneslover16)_

_By Drizzle117_

* * *

_"It is customary for a gentleman to give up his cushy pillow for a beautiful lady?"_

_"Oh! Sure."_

…

_"You may go now."_

The mongoose grinned in a giddy sort of way, bowing repeatedly as he backed away from the fluffy tan-and-brown Pomeranian. She blinked up at him before settling her head on her paws and closing her eyes, which were decorated with ice blue eye shadow.

Ah, Madame Pom had done it again.

After watching a dance act by Penny and Vinnie, the Pomeranian sighed and rested her head on her paws once more, preparing to go to sleep.

All of a sudden a terrible stench hit the cream model's nose; she blinked her eyes rapidly, trying to blink away the tears that had formed at the horrid smell. She couldn't place a paw on it, but that smell was like every awful thing she had scented before, tripled.

What could create a smell like that? Madame Pom stood carefully, blinking about her, trying to pinpoint the location of her discomfort. All she could see was a wafting green-brown mist fogging around the room; that had to be it.

"Who is there?" she called out in her heavily accented voice, glaring around the room with pure ice blue eyes (very much like Zoe's; not that she would ever admit it). "Who is making this smell that disturbs me from my beauty sleep?"

No one answered, but Madame didn't mind this; she hadn't expected them to. Curling up her tail into a fluffy spiral along her back, she trotted over to the place where the mist was being emitted in the thickest—having to cover her nose with one paw as she made her way towards the heart of the smell.

And sitting there, in the middle of it all, wrapped up in a large, fluffy, grey-and-white tail, was Pepper the skunk.

Now, Madame Pom hadn't really had a chance to introduce herself to a lot of the Littlest Pet Shop pets, besides Penny Ling and Vinnie, but this skunk had appeared to be a good friend of Zoe's, which made the Pomeranian quite prone to dislike her, but seeing her so forlornly wrapped up in her own tail, emitting this terrible stench, something must be wrong.

"Pepper?" the cream colored dog asked tentatively. The skunk turned her head slightly, peering out at the Pomeranian with rose colored eyes. When she noticed who had said her name, an irritated look crossed the grey-and-white skunk's face.

"Oh, it's you," she grumbled. "What do _you _want?"

"Pepper, darling." Trying (and failing, to some extent) to sit next to the skunk without covering her nose, Madame Pom wrapped her curly tail over Pepper's back. "What's wrong? You look…" Searching for the right word was difficult, so the Pomeranian finally settled on, "…annoyed."

For a few more heartbeats the skunk did nothing. She remained as still as a statue—and Madame would know; she had seen plenty on her world-wide travels. For a moment, the Pomeranian was nervous that the skunk was just going to ignore her—but suddenly Pepper sprang to her paws, teeth gritted, eyes fixed on Madame Pom as if she was something a cat had forgotten to bury.

"I really _wish _I had my rubber chicken right now," she hissed through gritted teeth.

"And why is that, dear?" The cream and tan dog tried her best to look beautiful and concerned at the same time, while still attempting not to breathe in the stink—quite a challenge, she quickly discovered.

"To strangle you with it," Pepper grumbled sulkily, her lower lip sticking out in an ill-fated pout. Madame Pom, quite surprised by this answer, blinked several times, as if it had been an illusion. It wasn't, though. The skunk was still there, glaring at her with rose colored beams that seemed like they could kill.

"But…but for what possible _reason _would you want to do that?" Madame stuttered, completely at a loss for words.

As an answer, Pepper glared once more through eyes that were little more than slits, and then coughed slightly, putting a failed attempt at an accent into her tone. "Ah-ah-ahem…_It is customary for a gentleman to give up his cushy pillow for a beautiful lady?_"

At first Madame completely blanked. She had no idea what the skunk was talking about, or for whatever reason why. She almost said something, when the truth dawned on her like a stage light, flashing straight into her mind. "Oh…_oh._"

Pepper crossed her arms and turned away.

The Pomeranian's mind was racing. She had to say something quickly, before the skunk brought out the wave of stink again—no, she couldn't have that. But what could comfort her? What could she possibly say?

"Pepper, darling," she began. "A model, or a diva, no less, does not take romantic interests lightly. She must contemplate before deciding, and flirt while doing this, as to make available…" The cream and brown dog paused on the last word, considering her options. "…choices."

"Zo's a diva, and a used-to-be-model," the skunk grumbled, still not turning around to face Madame. "How come _she _doesn't do any of that stuff?"

"Because she is not an accomplished model as I am. I have seen the greats, traveled the world…" The Pomeranian stared with sullen eyes. "All I can do is hope that you believe me, and forgive me…" She laughed, a tinkling, accented laugh. "Sunil isn't even really my type…"

A loud squeal from Minka prevented Pepper from saying anything more. "FOOD!"

"Minka, be quiet!" Russell hissed, as Madame Pom's ears flicked up. She _had _been feeling rather hungry…

Suddenly there was a swat to the back of her head; jumping in surprise, the dog model whipped around to see Pepper snickering, fingering her rubber chicken. "Surprise! Yeah, I forgive you—but_ that _was for being a flirty diva_."_

And before Madame could get in another word of sarcasm—who knows, perhaps Pepper had just messed up her hair!—the skunk darted off and dove with a happy grin on her face into the pile of food. Smirking, the Pomeranian smiled, trotted over, and began to eat delicately.

It was only then that she realized she had never gotten her beauty sleep.

**AN: If you want to know what inspired this story, go to DeviantArt and look in the gallery of Cartuneslover16. The title of the picture is the same as the title of this one-shot—For a Beautiful Lady. It's really good, and I recommend you go check it out! **

**Now, about this one-shot—this is the first of three Peppunil's I've been planning to write (but I'll throw some time for Vinnieling in there too, and maybe some Russinka!). I'm not particularly sure this completely falls in with the episode, so please don't judge me on that—I worked really hard on making sure it lines up. Pretty much this whole exchange goes on while Russell is trying to clean up as Penny and Vinnie are dancing. It could also be imagined as a scene that just never took place (which it should have). I loved Eve of Destruction, by the way—my second favorite episode after Gailbreak!**

**My final word on this is that this exchange between Pepper and Madame Pom explains why she called Sunil and Pepper (together!) over to look at her modeling pictures—because she knew if she just called Sunil her complexion would be messed up by the stink that would follow XD **

**Hmm, at the rate I'm going, first I wrote Dance like you Know you Can, and now this, and then Cobra Confessions (which you guys should be seeing later ;) ) and then the one that'll take place after "Lights, Camera, Mongoose!" … I'm going to be named the biggest Peppunil shipper on this whole site—and I'm perfectly fine with that. :3 **

**Thanks to Cartuneslover17, who helped me with this somewhat! I used her line about the rubber chicken ^^"**

**~Driz**


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